A massive influx of new Christmas gamers coupled with a denial of service attack brought both the Playstation Network and Xbox Live to their knees yesterday. While Microsoft appears to have partially recovered, Sony is still sucking wind – with no ETA on restoring service. And, beyond the consoles, many games themselves are down with back-end problems.

After recording my first flawless victory, in terms of K/D ratio, and frequently landing the top spot in Hardpoint gameplay, it’s time to retire my Titanfall mech. As you probably know, Titanfall launched a month ago as the first, big exclusive Xbox One title and the game is also notable by forgoing a single player campaign, offering only online combat. In fact, its release finally compelled me to pick up the Xbone One via Titanfall bundle on day one.

In terms of gameplay, the Titanfall controls are mostly spot on – I’d say pretty close to flawless when playing as a human and generally very good when strapped into your mech. Available weaponry is well balanced, although as with most shooters, snipers will be frustrated when they’re taken down at range by a mere assault rifle. And satchel charges do supersize damage – including usage as a more effective grenade. Continue Reading…

By way of an overseas regulatory agency, similar to our very own FCC, we continue to hone in on the elusive Amazon media streamer. And it’s looking to be something far more substantial than a Roku or Chromecast competitor. As the story goes, an Amazon fall set-top box launch was delayed with the potential Apple TV competitor now looking quite likely for a March or April delivery. Netflix and Hulu appear to be confirmed, along does a forked Android build – similar to what Amazon has done with their line of Kindle Fire tablets. Which makes gaming out of the box quite likely.

The uncovered wireless Bluetooth controller features a gaggle of controls, including both shoulder buttons and triggers, in addition to media playback transport controls – ideal for the aforementioned streaming services in addition to Amazon Instant, of course. And we give Amazon credit for using Android-esque iconography for home, menu, and back. Additionally, the central radioactive-looking button presumably taps into Amazon’s GameCircle – perhaps to evolve beyond merely a gaming app hub and into something more full featured akin to Apple’s Game Center or Xbox Live. A LED array is used as an indicator for both battery levels and Bluetooth connectivity. Lastly, we expect the controller, powered by a pair of double As, would be sold as an accessory and ultimately also designed to work with Amazon’s line of tablets to close the circle. Won’t be long now…

If we stay in one place, we will become outdated. We are thinking about a new business structure. Given the expansion of smart devices, we are naturally studying how smart devices can be used to grow the game-player business.

While Nintendo has produced all sorts of compelling hardware (Virtualboy!) over the years, they haven’t always found sales success and aren’t nearly as relevant as Microsoft and Sony in the console space… which I attribute to their slow embrace of HD. Continue Reading…